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Essential government workers:
- Federal government employees who've been deemed important enough that they haven't been furloughed, but who yet aren't getting paid.
Though I understand why some essential government workers may not strike, a huge bloc of them, most notably TSA airport workers and/or air traffic controllers, should have gone on strike on Jan. 4, 2019. Why that group of government employees?
Those two groups of essential employees are both "visible" and numerous enough that their striking could very rapidly move either (1) a veto-proof Congressional bill's passage or (2) the POTUS and Congress to collaboratively get the government funded and reopened.
- Because planes don't fly without them.
- Because there are far too many of them and their training lag times too long to rapidly replace them to get planes flying again.
- They can literally shutdown US air transportation -- passenger and freight -- for a couple months at least.
- Because they are "regular" people whose roles position them to have pivotal, unignorable impacts. America's commercial sectors -- anyone who needs to fly; anyone who ships stuff on FedEx, UPS, etc. -- would lay massive pressure on Trump and Congress to get the government up and running again.
The US is democracy and this seems like one of the times when "the people," not their elected representatives, need to take the lead to achieve a specific outcomes.
Oddly enough, I agree with you. There are really only 800,000? people effected by this shutdown. They are essentially pawns in idiotic political death match between Trump, pelosi and Schumer. They should start protesting in front of both the White House and congress and put out the real possibility of a work stoppage if they arent going to get paid. A strike should be the last resort, but that should be thrown out there as a bomb that will go off if the two sides dont sit down and reach an agreement.
They can’t strike, but they CAN call in sick and enough TSA officers have been doing it that some terminals have been having to close early.
Hell must be getting a few degrees cooler; that was a hard earned ”like!”
That legislation basically allows Congress and POTUSes to use government workers and government services as pawns.My brother was in the PATCO union when they struck under Reagan. He remained on the job due to economics; wife and kids. Federal employees are not “allowed” to strike.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Service_Labor-Management_Relations_Statute
PATCO: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PATCO
they're probably afraid of being fired. even in the waning days of a good economy, finding a new job isn't cake. more often than not, it requires a move, and that can be a massive hassle. "oh, junior, BTW. you know all of those friends you've had your whole life? yeah, i'm going to have to go ahead and ask you to sort of say goodbye to all of them because some orange blob who you don't care about is trying to gain political points by withholding my pay. pack your ****, kiddo! woohoo!" when the alternative is getting paid a month or two late, that still seems to be the path of least resistance.
doesn't mean that they can't slow **** down in almost imperceivable increments, though.
Moving is the economically sage thing to do if one one's utility function values income over physical proximity to one's friends. If, however, one values proximity over income, one should not move. Both choices have consequences. That's the way it is.
moving is a massive life change. if i felt that the orange blob's temper tantrum was likely to end in a month or two, i would be unlikely to go through finding a new job / uprooting / selling the house, / finding a new one / dealing with months of mortgage BS / informing my wife that she has to find a new job / informing my kid that it's time for a new school / all of that. it's easier to lean up a little for a couple months and wait it out. this is why i think that there hasn't been a strike.
Trump should replace them with illegals and change their status to H1B. Americans dont have the market cornered on qualifications.
That solution approach wouldn't "come online" for several months, even if such an order were today issued. It would take a couple months due to the training (and background checking) lag.
They should strike...Shut it all down
Red:
I accept that you think it is. I'm fine with accepting that many others think so too. That is what it is. The implication of it being so merely gives one a qualitative sense of the quantitative value one places on, for whatever reason(s), remaining where one is at the moment.
Remaining in place being one factor in one's composite utility function or, if one prefers, a discrete element of utility that can be compared with the utility of having income.
Blue:
Fine. What you've shared is a narrative description of the relative utility you have for (1) remaining in place vs. that you have for current income. As above noted, it is entirely your choice to define the utility values for those two things. I'm willing to respect your value assignments of those two elements of utility so long as you are okay with accepting (rather than whining about/bemoaning) the consequences of acting rationally in accordance with the utility values you've chosen to assign to "remaining in place" and "having current income."
Note: it doesn't matter that you may not have quantified the two utility elements. What matters is that you have determined one is materially more valuable to you than the other.
I didn't and won't go that far.
would you uproot your family and change jobs over a month or two month shutdown? what does that look like? have you considered all of the moving parts in that decision? ever tried to change jobs with no references because you were terminated for striking?
you asked why more aren't striking and risking termination. i explained.
Red:
As I noted before, you have your utility function. That is what it is. I have mine, and it clearly differs from yours.
- Today/now --> No.
- About fifteen years or more ago --> Yes.
- At that point in my life I hadn't reached the point where my family's financial position was secure enough that I could risk being subjected to a protracted period of uncertain duration (which is what this shutdown represents given the irreconcilable and mutually exclusive nature of the differences between/demands of the two sides) without current income. I earned a fine income at the time, but I also had huge cash outflows -- four kids in boarding school, three mortgages, a boat note, leveraged investments, no spousal income to help "weather the storm," so to speak, etc.
If a shutdown were to have caused my income flows to stop indefinitely, no matter what "rosy" outlook I may have hoped for, I would have sold my firm and taken up work on Wall St. to make sure I didn't compromise the vision I and my kids had for their futures. My kids' futures weren't something I have ever been willing to risk, yet I've been even more risk averse in that regard since my wife's passing.
ETA:
Blue:
I don't recall that -- no references -- being among the key drivers to your calculus.
I just checked...You didn't even allude to such a thing. (BTW, AFAIK, gov't references entail nothing beyond noting that one did indeed work where one stated one has worked and that other objective details of one's representations are factually accurate. They're not at all like private sector professional references...though in the private sector, one's name and reputation generally precedes one.)
Be that as it may, I don't see why one's prior job performance wouldn't speak for itself.
moving is a massive life change. if i felt that the orange blob's temper tantrum was likely to end in a month or two, i would be unlikely to go through finding a new job / uprooting / selling the house, / finding a new one / dealing with months of mortgage BS / informing my wife that she has to find a new job / informing my kid that it's time for a new school / all of that. it's easier to lean up a little for a couple months and wait it out. this is why i think that there hasn't been a strike.
Typical TSA screener salary is between $29k and $42k, not conducive to being able to just drive/fly to DC and strike/protest and also not very conducive to "toughing it out during lean months". They need every penny of their pay if they don't wish to become homeless.
Trump is using the weakest and most vulnerable as pawns in his hostage drama, and they are basically now reduced to BEGGING for help.
they're on the low end, and i wouldn't be surprised if many of them take other jobs. however, i read in a news article that the average federal salary is $37 an hour. i'd wait a while if i were making that much and had a lot invested in the career.
TSA workers are in a separate special tier that does not make a typical "GS" salary.
That's why they only get between 29 and 42 thousand a year. They are government workers but in a strange twist, they are outside the "Government Services" salary table.
sounds like they don't get treated very well by their employers or by the general public. they'll probably lose a lot of them, as i doubt that they can afford to work for free while Trump floats his ego.
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